


Home, Sweet Home

by Hormonal_Trashbag



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Exhibitionism, F/M, Happy Ending, Moving In Together, Secret Relationship, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-29
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2018-12-21 06:42:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11938488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hormonal_Trashbag/pseuds/Hormonal_Trashbag
Summary: He threw the stick into drive, fixing his dark look on the road as he merged into traffic. “‘If Kylo tries to pull a move,’” he mimicked with a sneer. “As if I’m not allowed to pull a move on my own girlfriend.”“I’m sorry,” she repeated, more quietly. It was impossible to not realize that keeping their relationship a secret bothered him but he was always so adamant.We’ll wait until you’re ready.Ben was so careful not to push her.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I...don't really know what this is. Fluff? Humor? Smut?? A dash of angst???

“You _really_ don’t need to move out,” Rose insisted for the umpteenth time. She felt guilty, as if she was invading in a space Rey hadn’t fully felt was hers anyway. It didn’t matter that Rey had known Finn and Poe longer--they had always had a closeness that she hadn’t been a part of--now they had met Rose.

Rey was unbelievably happy for the three of them. While it meant the end of an era of late night movie binges and overflowing cartons of chow mein, she knew when to step away. It was time.

Terrified as it made her, Rey knew moving in with Ben would make life so much easier.

“Don’t worry about me,” Rey smiled, hugging Rose. “Ben isn’t as bad as Finn and Poe make him out to be.”

Poe scoffed loudly from the other room. “Kylo is exactly as bad as I make him out to be! Dramatic, whiny, self-obsessed--”

“--And utterly insane!” Finn added.

Rey huffed. “You two know he doesn’t go by Kylo anymore. Just because you knew him in high school doesn’t mean you know who he is now, Poe.”

Poe came storming into the room, face flushed with excited humor as if he hadn’t told this story a hundred times before. “He’d actually _ask_ the teachers to call him that on the first day of class. Can you believe that? And they would! It was completely ridiculous. Him and his weird drama club buddies thought he was going to be this _great_ actor. They’d march around school in these stupid, black coats like a bunch of constipated vampires. Too bad Juilliard rejected him.”

She held her tongue. Rey knew Poe and Ben had been playground friends once. Puberty had made Ben lonely and cruel, he had willingly admitted to that, while it had made Poe the dashing quarterback that was seen with a new cheerleader on his arm every other month. At least, that was how Ben had understood it. Their extreme differences had destroyed all chances of continued friendship and now, there was too much bad blood between them.

That didn’t stop her from wishing they could get along. Trying to convince Ben to mend the relationship had been a fruitless endeavor, he had shut down completely after a single statement.

_Dameron has enough friends as it is._

Finn laughed from the other room, repeating to himself, “Constipated vampires?”

Rey huffed, rolling her eyes pointedly. “Anyway,” she continued to tell Rose, “these two idiots are your problem now. Make sure they don’t burn the apartment building down by trying to cook their own Chinese.”

“That was one time!” Poe grinned. “Don’t pretend you weren’t standing in the kitchen next to us!”

“Yes,” Rey agreed solemnly, “holding the fire extinguisher.”

Rose returned the gesture with her own eye roll, giving Rey a knowing look. Poe was not, by any stretch of the imagination, the seasoned chef he claimed to be.

“No ganging up on me,” he demanded, stooping down to give Rose a slobbery kiss to her cheek.

There was a knock at the door.

Rey hurried to open it. She hadn’t seen Ben in almost a week and it was impossible to keep from beaming up at him. His lips quirked into a crooked half-smile that quickly dropped once he noticed Poe, joined then by Finn, on the other side of the door. Rose stood nervously between them.

 

* * *

 

Ben sat at the small, circular table of an outdoor cafe, drumming his fingertips on its smooth surface. It was too early for lunch so Hux had insisted on bloody marys, sensing that this meeting was supposed to be a celebration of some sort.

It was best to just say it. “Rey is moving in with me.”

Hux looked up from his phone, blinking with what _could_ have been surprise.

“You’re fucking,” he declared after a moment of silent speculation. It sounded almost like an accusation.

Ben looked away, frowning. It wasn’t as if Hux was _wrong_.

“Wait,” Hux continued with just a hint of alarm. “Is it a boy or a girl?”

Ben’s nostrils flared with swift fury, his eyes darting towards him with a harsh glare. “She isn’t pregnant!”

Hux leaned back in his patio chair, considering him carefully. Their waiter returned with their cocktails, smoothly asking if they were ready to order, to which Hux quickly interrupted with a low tone.

“Give us another few minutes.”

The boy scurried off, leaving Hux to study Ben as he took a long gulp of his bloody mary. The bartender had put in a tad too much horseradish for his tastes but the copious amounts of vodka more than made up for it.

“Are you done looking at me like I’m a science experiment?” Ben snarled.

Hux crossed his arms, pursing his lips. “You’re in love with her.”

_That_ was definitely an accusation.

Ben glanced upwards. It was cloudy, though he doubted they would get any rain until later. Perhaps in the late afternoon, if there was further accumulation. He hoped it wasn’t until he managed to get the last of Rey’s boxes to his apartment.

For all his years of acting, Ben had never been much of a liar. “I am.”

“Does she love you?”

The question stung more than it should have. Ben knew he wasn’t a loveable man, that he was bearish and complicated. He looked then at his drink, watching a drop of condensation glide down the side of the glass to avoid looking at his long-time almost-friend.

Hux sighed, reaching for his glass. “If you aren’t sure, you shouldn’t be living together. You realize couples who move in together are only a step below marriage.”

Of this, Ben was keenly aware.

Hux looked hesitant. “Has she... _told_ you that--”

_“Yes!”_

Ben and Hux didn’t have this kind of relationship. They didn’t share feelings or talk about _love_. They snapped at each other like feral dogs and enjoyed looking down their noses at those they considered lower than them.

But Hux was reaching out in a way he never had before. Part of Ben craved that connection, though he loathed to admit it.

“She hasn’t told her friends about us,” he admitted softly. “We’ve kept this completely hidden because she’s worried about what they’ll think.”

He never told her how much the secrecy chafed. Ben was afraid to ask for too much when he already felt undeserving. He wasn’t going to risk her pulling away from him.

He smiled weakly into his bloody mary, then signaled at their waiter. Hux let him change the subject.

Their conversation was still on his mind as Ben drove to pick up Rey, and as he took the stairs up to the apartment she had been sharing with Dameron and his boyfriend rather than the elevator. It was on his mind as he slowly lifted his hand to knock, and as the door swung open.

Then she was standing a foot away, her cheeks in danger of splitting open with how widely she grinned at him and Ben felt guilty for doubting her. It took serious self-control to keep a grip on his urge to bend forward and kiss her, regardless of her stupid friends. Why did they matter when she belonged in his arms, molded to him?

Dameron cleared his throat, a stern, oddly fatherly expression pinching his handsome face. His boyfriend-- _Finn,_ he reminded himself--was equally severe, a rather short woman standing between them.

“I think we should have some ground rules,” Dameron said.

Ben quietly seethed, able to see Rey’s confused frown from the corner of his eye. His hands formed into tight fists at his sides, his nails digging into the meat of his palms deep enough to draw blood.

Dameron was looking at Rey then, unjustified concern flooding his face. “I know you’re friends with him, or whatever--”

_Or whatever._

Ben might have punched the man if he hadn’t known what it would do to Rey. She stiffened next to him and he wondered if Dameron’s vocal opinion was ruining what slim chance he had of having a public relationship with her.

Finn, at least, recognized that she was displeased. “We’re just worried about you.”

Dameron blundered on. “If Kylo tries to pull a move on you, you’re more than welcome to come home--”

“I’m standing right here,” Ben bristled. “I haven’t gone by that name in years, and you _know_ that.”

“I can’t keep track of all the flip-flopping,” he said, waving his hand casually.

“Take too many hits to the head?” Ben snarled back. “Though I suppose you’ve always been dim--”

“Enough,” Rey snapped. “Both of you!”

The only satisfaction Ben found was that he hadn’t started it. The fact that Dameron looked properly mollified by her admonition had him smirking.

“Ben, please help me grab the boxes.”

He was more than happy to take off his jacket and hand it over to her, the arms of his tee shirt straining around his biceps, the material tight around the width of his shoulders and chest. Maybe he was showing off, now that he wasn’t the scrawny drama club nerd in high school and _maybe_ he had chosen a shirt that was a little too small for him. Gratification coiled in his gut at the stunned look on Dameron’s face. It was petty but Ben hardly cared.

“It’s just the books left, right?” he asked, already crouching down to lift the stack of small boxes that belied their considerable weight.

They were heavy. Well over a hundred pounds. If it wasn’t for sheer stubbornness, he might have dropped them on his own toes. With his muscles bulging--burning with exertion--Ben forced himself to take slow, easy steps to the door.

“I’ll be by the car,” he shot over his shoulder, pausing in the small foyer. “Come down when you’re ready.”

All four inhabitants of the apartment stared at his back--also bursting with corded muscles--as he turned to disappear down the hall. He wasn’t so proud that he refused to take the elevator down, though.

 

* * *

 

Rey laughed. She couldn’t help it. Shaking her head, grinning like a madwoman, she hugged her dear friends and told them with no uncertainty:

“I trust Ben, so don’t go pushing his buttons like that again. Do you really want to irritate the man I’ll be living with?”

Rey knew that irritation would be funneled into more productive activities later but Poe’s overprotective comments had been unnecessary and...well. _Mean_. She didn’t like seeing that side of him.

“I’m not a child and you’re not my parents,” she reminded them. “I can take care of myself.”

Poe gave her a sheepish look. “I know, but--”

“No _buts,_ she interrupted. I want my last memory of living here to be happy.”

At that, she gave the three of them a final squeeze and rushed after Ben. The mule of a man probably needed help with those boxes, she had struggled to carry more than one.

He was already in the car, air conditioning running in the humidity of late summer, his face pink from the heavy lifting, small beads of sweat clinging to his forehead. Rey slid into the passenger seat and, elated at their sudden freedom, curled an arm around his neck to bring his mouth to hers.

“That was dumb,” she snickered against his lips. He huffed a deep laugh. “You didn’t hurt yourself, did you?”

His tongue dipped into her mouth, swiping broadly to taste her breath. She might have jumped into his lap then and there, if it weren’t for the possibility of one of her friends peering out the window to see Ben’s car idling in front of their building.

“I’m fine,” he whispered, gently shifting back.

She chased his lips for a short, chaste kiss that smacked loudly. “Good. I’m sorry about Poe, I didn’t think he’d be so difficult.”

He threw the stick into drive, fixing his dark look on the road as he merged into traffic. “‘If Kylo tries to pull a move,’” he mimicked with a sneer. “As if I’m not allowed to pull a move on my own girlfriend.”

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, more quietly. It was impossible to not realize that keeping their relationship a secret bothered him but he was always so adamant. _We’ll wait until you’re ready._

Ben was so careful not to push her.

She was wearing a loose, flowing skirt that fell to her knees and his hand hiked it up just enough to rest over the curve of her thigh and give an affectionate squeeze. His palm was warm against her skin. Rey covered his knuckles with her own hand, slowly pushing him up the length of her leg.

“Would it make you feel better if I said I wasn’t wearing underwear?” she murmured.

“Oh, definitely,” he breathed back, fingers skimming her skin without her guidance, torturously slow to reach the cleft between her thighs.

Her head fell back against the seat as he brushed along her slit, rubbing around her throbbing bud but never applying pressure directly. His fingers traced up and down, slowly stoking but never sinking into the warmth of her sex. Rey let her head loll to one side, gasping as he grazed her clit, staring out the passenger window to see her faint reflection in the glass, her lips shiny and red as she whimpered.

At the next red light, he leaned over to suck the exposed edge of her jaw, staying there so long that the car behind him honked when the light turned green.

He retrieved his hand with a smirk, giving her a pointed look as he licked his fingers clean. She realized they were only a street away from his building.

“Ben,” she whined, “I don’t like being teased.”

He kept his eyes on the road, as if he hadn’t heard her, but when she glanced at his lap she could see the outline of his cock through his constricting jeans, begging to be freed. After a long few seconds of silence, he hummed thoughtfully.

“Touch yourself,” he said. “Just like I did, nothing more.”

Rey moaned, widening her hips and tugging the thin material up to her waist to expose herself. She could only shift slightly towards him, her backside in the corner between her seat and the door, one leg stretching into the backseat of the car while the other remained in the foot space of the passenger side.

Before Ben, public sex had been completely out of the question. He made her fearless, daring in a way no other man had before. Someone passing in the other lane could look into their vehicle and _see,_ but she couldn’t find the will to care. Not when Ben’s gaze rapidly flicked between the road and her cunt. Her fingers dragged through her folds with the same slow movements he had used, her eyes never leaving him.

There was a spot on her skirt below her backside that grew darker and shined as her slick spilled from swollen, pink flesh.

He pulled over with a rough jerk on the wheel. Barely giving her the chance to straighten herself at their sudden arrival, Ben rushed to her side of the car to throw the door open and yank her out. He left her boxes in the trunk, hard against her backside as he walked them into the building and to the elevator. She wasn’t sure if he had even bothered to lock the car.

The elevator dinged and was mercifully empty--he pressed her forward, not even willing to wait until the doors were fully closed before he was bending her over, her fingers curling around the elevator railing. She heard him unzip his jeans and a moment later he had thrown her skirt up over her bottom and was plunging into her with a sharp roll of his hips.

Rey hissed. He didn’t give her any time to adjust to his considerable girth, starting with a relentless, brutal rhythm that had her sagging bonelessly, the railing her only support.

“Is this better?” he growled as he pounded into her at a punishing rate, their skin making audible slaps. “Is it worth the teasing?”

A large hand snaked around her body to crush her breast in it’s hold. Rey struggled to meet his thrusts as they knocked the air from her lungs, rocking backwards against him.

“Yes, _oh, fuck,_ yes. Give me more, Ben--”

He grunted, driving into her with even more force.

And then the elevator dinged.

She could have laughed at the high, keening sound Ben made in the back of the throat if it wasn’t for the strangling panic that gripped her. He didn’t have time to force his cock into his jeans and Rey squealed as he came to a quick decision.

Still buried inside her, he pulled her up to stand straight and dropped her skirt to fall around her legs, curling his arms about her waist and leaning against the back of the elevator, his chin on her shoulder as if he was merely embracing her from behind.

Every slight movement of him against her made Rey ache with need. He sighed as he saw the new passenger, a short, elderly woman she knew to be Maz. Ben had told her once that she was practically blind and had refused to replace her glasses for years. She went limp against him, smiling nervously as Maz offered a short hello.

“Hi, Maz,” Ben uttered weakly. The rumble of his voice was absolutely decadent and Rey couldn’t help clenching around him at the sound of it. He tried to disguise his answering groan, _“Uhh_ \--this is my girlfriend, Rey.”

She shivered. She wasn’t used to him introducing her as more than his friend and she found it did things to her. Unable to resist, Rey nudged her backside against his groin, forcing him deeper. His arms tightened.

Maz assessed them quietly, nodding to herself. She was only going one floor up and so the ride was brief.

As she stepped out, she glanced back to say, “Ben Solo, if I ever catch you two desecrating the elevator again, I _will_ call your mother. It smells like a damned brothel in there.”

Rey stared at the woman in horror, frozen even after the doors slid shut once more.

Ben chuckled, still deep inside her. In a matter of seconds, he was laughing loudly, shaking his head as he bent forward and jolted into her.

“This isn’t funny!” she snapped back, tightening her muscles around his cock until he choked on his laughter. “I wanted to leave a good impression on our neighbors!”

He scraped his teeth along her neck as he continued to fuck her. “It’s _hilarious_. Your pussy is dripping because we got caught. You _loved_ that, you naughty little exhibitionist--”

Rey shifted the angle of her hips, grinding into him. “Shut up!”

She didn’t even realize they had reached their floor until suddenly she was empty, him patting her backside to get her to move as he tucked himself into his jeans with considerable effort. If they didn’t have to walk down a long hall, Rey was certain he would have marched her right to the door, still inside her.

He was right. She could feel her arousal slipping down her inner thighs.

Rey was practically dizzy with desire by the time they reached home. Without a moment to waste, Ben picked her up and slammed her against the front door, getting his jeans off with one hand as she wrapped her arms around his neck. With a cry, she sank onto his length, reveling in how he stretched her open. His hands were pushing her shirt over her breasts, his mouth opening wide to take one into his moist heat as their hips clapped together wetly.

Rey snuck an arm between their bodies to strum at the hard point of her clit, sobbing as he stroked the textured flesh along the roof of her sex.

“Oh, Ben--yes, right there. Yes, yes, _yes--”_

His tongue lapped at her nipple, and she knocked her head on the door.

“Fuck,” he panted, “are you okay?”

Rey moaned, clenching her fingers in his hair and tugging him to her lips. His breath came hot and fast, steaming against her face as they struggled to kiss.

His hips never paused and it didn’t take long for him to force her over the edge, his thick cock moving in and out of her as she fluttered and gyrated desperately, her walls clamping down on him with a grip that made him shout.

He pulsed within her, spending himself until his thighs trembled with the strain of keeping them up, his veins on his forehead and neck jutting out.

Ben stumbled backward, collapsing to his knees before letting them flop onto the floor, still intimately joined and their sweaty limbs tangled.

With a hoarse snicker, he said, “Home, sweet home.”

Rey propped herself up to brush her lips over the tip of his pointed nose.

 

* * *

 

Ben found it necessary to re-consummate the entire apartment. Before, he had only ever fucked her at _his_ place. Now, when he propped her up on the kitchen table and ate her out, it was _their_ table. _Their_ shower. _Their_ couch. Now, it was _their_ bed they lay on.

Her fingers were clasping _their_ sheets as he slowly filled her inch by inch. They hadn’t had this much sex in months. He should have been exhausted after taking her again and again, but her bright, hazel eyes would find his and Ben would crave more. A greedy, hungry beast coiled in his gut, demanding to feast on her. Rey happily welcomed it.

It was dark outside, the orange glow of city lights softened by rain. Rey had thrown open the bedroom window to let in the smell of wet asphalt and steady pitter-patter. He could stay with her like this, completely connected, for an eternity.

In the unlit room, his hand found her cheek, and Ben gently cupped her flushed, tacky skin, tipping her face upward so he could kiss her bruised lips.

It was so perfect he could have cried. She gasped into his mouth, tongue twisting with his as her legs wound around his waist to bring him closer.

Ben outright snarled when there was a rapping at the door. They had called to order pizza twenty minutes ago but the delivery time was an hour and a half and he sincerely doubted it would come early.

“Ben,” she mumbled, calves unhooking from around him.

There was no way he was going to answer the door now. It was probably Maz, stopping by to further chastise him for stinking up the elevator with the stench of sex.

“Whoever it is can come back later,” he whispered, gripping her knee to pull it over his hip.

Rey hummed, her hair faintly rustling on their sheets as she nodded. She arched into the next reel of his hips, her lips curved upwards as they met once more.

Then there was a vaguely familiar voice. “Rey? Are you here? You forgot something at the apartment and I wanted to drop it off before it disappeared into a black hole.”

Ben ducked his forehead into the crook of her neck, grunting. “You gave one of them a key? Seriously?”

She shushed him, hissing back, “It was supposed to be for emergencies!”

She should have known better, he thought bitterly. She was the one so set on keeping them under wraps. Why would she give her friends every opportunity to happen upon them?

Rey cleared her throat, unable to keep her voice from taking a shrill edge “Give me a sec, Rose, I’ll be right there!”

Ben let her push him away but hadn’t taken into consideration the fact that the room was dark and the clothes they had worn earlier were still on the bathroom floor across the narrow hall.

“All my clothes are still in boxes!” she frantically whispered. “I can’t go out there in a sheet!”

“Grab something of mine,” he murmured.

“Girls don’t wear the clothes of guys they aren’t fucking!”

“I don’t know what to tell you! We don’t exactly have very many options here--”

“Rey?” Rose called out again. “Is everything okay?”

Rey flung herself from the bed and scrambled for his dresser. Desperate times called for desperate measures and it seemed wearing his clothing was better than none at all. Huffing, he slumped onto his back. His cock was jutting towards his belly button but Ben decided to ignore it, prickly now that he knew what should have been the ideal end to the best day ever was officially cut short. Because his girlfriend wasn’t willing to admit they were dating to her best friends.

“Yes!” She cried back, “It’s fine! I’m coming--”

He snorted. “Not likely.”

_“Ben!”_ she snapped under her breath. “Not helping!”

“What’s going on?” Rose asked, voice coming from much closer. “Why are you in the dark?”

Ben shot up in surprise.

The light switched on.

Rey was still by his dresser, trying to pick through his shirt drawer, and she whirled around with a panicked look. Dameron and Finn’s petite girlfriend stood stunned in the open doorway. With pink cheeks, she swerved to look away, yelping.

“Oh my god, you’re both naked!”

Ben barked a laugh. What a nightmare.

“You’re sleeping together?” Rose continued. “I thought you were just friends!”

He wasn’t going to say anything. She was Rey’s friend and it hadn’t been his idea to keep it from her or Finn or Dameron in the first place. It was on Rey to admit to the truth.

“I--I saw your penis and everything!”

“I’m not going to apologize for being naked at my own place,” he grumbled back.

Rey didn’t even scold him for his snarkiness. She was just standing frozen by the dresser. Ben sighed, rolling off the edge of the mattress.

Checking that their intruder was still faced away, he wrapped her in a hug, resting his cheek on the crown of her head. Her hair was wild and brown strands snagged on his stubble.

“Sweetheart,” he mumbled, “would it really be so bad if someone knew?”

Ben really hadn’t meant to sound so _hurt_ by it.

“Of course not!” Rey hurried to answer, her hands flying up to clutch his back. “I just wanted to be able to control when it happened. I was...I was trying to change Poe’s mind about you first. I don’t like how much he seems to hate you. And for such stupid reasons.”

He didn’t want to be the one to tell her that was a futile plan.

Ben released her, snatching a tee shirt for each of them from the open drawer, then a pair of sweatpants from another. She took a pair of boxers instead, tugging them over her slender, tanned legs. He helped her into a shirt much too large for her willowy frame.

“Go on,” he grinned, tapping her cute, little backside.

Awkwardly, she coughed, approaching her friend. “Um, we’re decent now.”

Rose shifted reluctantly, having undoubtedly overheard their muted conversation.

“Ben is actually--well. He’s my boyfriend.”

 

* * *

 

The short discussion with Rose had been stilted and uncomfortable. She had been dating Ben longer than she had known Rose and somehow the lack of trust had injured her in a way Rey hadn’t anticipated. That had never been her intention, to imply she didn’t trust her friends, but in retrospect, Rey knew that was exactly what had happened.

She hadn’t believed that some of the most important people in her life could handle such an important thing.

Rose had promised to let Rey tell Finn and Poe but she knew she couldn’t put it off for very long.

Rey leaned closer to Ben, her legs thrown over his lap as they sat on the couch, eating mushroom and sausage pizza as they both ignored old reruns of _Futurama_.

“I’m sorry,” she finally said.

“Hmm?”

“It must have hurt you, too, that I wanted to keep everything between just us. Why didn’t you ever say something?”

He shrugged, looking into the half empty pizza box. “You’re out of my league. I’m not going to do anything that jeopardizes being with you.”

What?

Her mind reeled. Rey tossed her pizza crust into the box, disregarding her greasy hands as she gripped his chin and forced him to meet her gaze.

“Is that what you think?”

He pursed his lips. “I’m not going to pretend that I’m easy to get along with.”

“So?” she croaked. “I’m just as stubborn as you are. I didn’t want you to have to deal with this--” Rey sucked in, blinking rapidly. “Ben, I was trying to protect you.”

He closed his eyes, eyebrows drawing together, and Rey thought her chest might be collapsing. How could she be so oblivious to the feelings of everyone around her?

“You know I love you, right?” she sniffed.

“Yes,” he assured, bringing her into his arms.

She inclined her head, swiping at her eyes. “Good.”

They quietly held each other for a few minutes. His long fingers were tracing swirling patterns into her lower back.

“We should have a dinner party,” she blurted. “We can tell people we’re dating, then get them _really_ drunk.”

Ben pressed his soft lips to her forehead.

“I love you, too.”

She leaned up into a tender kiss, giggling as she told him, “You taste like garlic.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dammit.

Ben realized, rather belatedly, that hosting a dinner party for Rey’s friends in his own home, where he ate and slept and fucked and _lived,_ might be a mistake. He called Rey to tell her they should go to a restaurant, somewhere public so that his imminent murder was less likely, but she had already bought fondue pots and was looking at a beef tenderloin as she answered the phone.

“It’ll be fine,” she promised. He could hear her smile.

She thought his concern was _funny_. He huffed. “I’m inviting Hux, then.”

He had to even the playing field somehow.

“What?” she snapped back. “Ben, no. I thought we were trying to avoid making people uncomfortable.”

“Well, being outnumbered by people that hate me makes me uncomfortable,” he grumbled.

Rey was silent for a few seconds. He could imagine her staring hard at a line of plastic-wrapped meats, shifting her weight between her feet. Ben almost expected her to counter with _Poe doesn’t hate you,_ but they both knew that wasn’t totally true.

“He’s just going to laugh at you if this goes badly. Hux is hardly backup,” Rey warned. She added thoughtfully, “I’m not entirely sure why you’re friends with him.”

“We aren’t friends,” Ben snorted. “More like allies. On a good day.”

She laughed, he _adored_ the way she laughed, “I love you. Be home soon, so please, please vacuum.”

Ben shivered. It was so mundane, so domestic, but hearing her call their apartment home excited him in an odd way. He wondered if she could hear the smile in his voice, too.

“Grab an extra bottle of wine. I love you, too.”

If he didn’t, Ben wouldn’t bother dealing with her friends. This mattered to Rey, though. And he was tired of keeping this a secret.

Besides, maybe if they timed it right, Dameron would choke on something when they told him.

 

* * *

 

Ben had, in fact, vacuumed by the time she returned, ladened with grocery bags. He had even made the bed. She knew this because he promptly told her as she walked through the door, taking the heavy fondue pots from her hold. It reminded her of a dog, expecting a treat for performing a trick.

Rey saw no harm in rewarding him. The kiss was brief but she hummed into it, her tongue sliding over his full, lower lip.

“Did you take a shower yet?” she asked, pulling away.

His voice was strained, high-pitched and desperate. “I thought it might be more...economical if we took one together. You know, save water.”

She shook her head, grinning. “Having shower sex does _not_ save water.”

He followed her into the kitchen, setting the fondue pots down on the counter. “We don’t have to have sex,” he mumbled, “I just want to be naked with you.”

He was nervous, she realized. Rey set the six bottles of wine--four merlot and two chardonnay--in a neat row while he placed the cheese and meat in the refrigerator, his spine a tense, sharp line. She supposed he had every reason to be, she just hated that it was so complicated.

A hopeful voice in her head chimed that this would work out. Poe and Ben would get over their strange grudges. Neither of them were the same people they had been in high school, they just had to _see_ that.

She glanced at the microwave clock, it read _4:12._ Poe, Finn, and Rose, as well as Hux if he had agreed to come, shouldn’t be arriving until after six. They had time.

He was moving the vegetable platter to the top shelf when Rey curled her arms around his waist, pressing her face between his shoulder blades. Ben smelled like generic, pine deodorant and faintly of sweat. He relaxed slightly against her, letting out a slow, deep breath.

“Okay, come be naked with me,” she whispered.

He made a gleeful sound in the back of his throat, covering the hands she had on his stomach with one of his own to keep them there as he marched them over to the bathroom with lumbering steps. While he started the water she started to undress; by the time she was unhooking her bra, he turned around, tugging her forward by the belt loops of her jeans. He unzipped her, then pulled down her pants and underwear at the same time.

It wasn’t as if they hadn’t showered together in the past. They had, more times than Rey could count. It was just that sex had always been part of the equation. Somehow, it felt more intimate to join each other for the sole purpose of washing.

Ben guided her into the shower, but she pulled back the curtain to watch him lift the toilet seat and aim his flaccid penis at the porcelain bowl. Only serious couples watched each other urinate, she thought. Serious couples lived together and used the toilet in front of the each other. She must have looked stupid, smiling as she stared at Ben peeing.

“You’re going to give me stage fright,” he said. Ben didn’t look at her but she could see the tips of his ears turning pink with embarrassment.

“You’ve seen me pee,” she countered with a snicker.

He sighed as he finished. “Yeah, but it’s cute when you do it. You just sit there and _tinkle.”_

“Ew,” she laughed. “I hope that isn’t a weird kink you’ve been hiding from me.”

He rolled his eyes affectionately. “Anyway, there’s nothing cute about a guy pissing. It’s gross.”

Rey stepped out from under the stream of warm water as he flushed, avoiding it as flowed scalding for a few moments. She made room for him once it returned to a tolerable temperature and he joined her, for a moment resting his chin on her head as he gripped her hips. She surged up onto her toes to kiss him.

“It’s not about being cute. And I don’t think it’s gross when you do it.”

He raised a brow at her. “Maybe you’re the one with the weird kink.”

She slapped his chest without any real force. “Shut up and hand me the bar of soap.”

Rey lathered him up as he did the same for her, scrubbing him clean with a washcloth in perfunctory motions. It was probably the least sexy thing they had ever done in a shower before but she noticed when he hardened anyway, his hands spreading suds over her breasts. He ignored it, fingers leaving her wet skin to pour a generous pool of shampoo into his palm.

Her reach wasn’t long enough to comfortably reach his hair and she finished washing his larger body as he was tipping his head to rinse out the shampoo. She pecked at his chest, turning them slightly so that he blocked her from the shower head. He sucked in sharply when she closed her fingers around his length.

“Rey, you don’t have to--”

She squeezed him, ignoring his protest. He kept perfectly still, eyes fixed on her as she moved her lips down his stomach, sinking slowly to her knees.

“Do me a favor and wash my hair while I blow you,” she said, “and make sure soap doesn’t drip into my eyes.”

His answering laughter became strangled as she closed her lips around his bulbous, purpling head, her tongue flattening against his sensitive slit. He tasted like clean skin before the salty flavor of his precum dribbled into her mouth.

His fingers trembled slightly as he worked shampoo into her hair and she took him deeper, lips slowly moving down his cock. When the suds were fully integrated, he slicked back her wet locks, holding it all in a fist at the back of her head.

“You’re so beautiful with my dick in your mouth,” he rumbled, thighs shaking as he resisted the urge the thrust.

She closed her eyes, hollowing her cheeks as she bobbed up and down, listening to his every gasp and quiet moan with unbidden satisfaction. Rey could feel his muscles easing as she slurped and sucked, her tongue gliding along the underside his cock. The fingers she had wrapped around his base loosened as she relaxed her throat, shifting to fondle his balls as she accepted all of him, her nose tickled by coarse pubic hairs.

Ben needed this and she was more than happy to oblige.

When she gazed up at him, his mouth had dropped open as he panted, his face and chest flushed with arousal. His brown eyes were hazy as they stared back and she could tell he was close.

“Shit,” he hissed, hips shallowly jerking on instinct, “sorry, I’m--”

Rey gave him a long, languishing suck, pleased that he lost the ability to speak as he came in a hot burst of bitter fluid that hit the back of her throat. Blinking, she swallowed around him, lips splitting into a sloppy grin as he released a startled cry.

Chest heaving, his knees wobbling slightly, he leaned against the shower wall. She took his hand when he offered it, stepping under the showerhead to rinse out her hair. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder, still catching his breath as he captured her mouth, not caring that he could taste himself as his tongue swept along her own.

She knew he wanted more, to return the favor, but Rey slowed his brutal, hungry kiss, curling slick locks of dark hair behind his ear.

“We still have to get ready, Ben,” she chastised gently.

He grunted, large, rough hands lifting her off her feet to bring her closer.

“Don’t care,” he muttered, laving at the jump of her pulse. “Fuck them. Let’s just order Thai food and get them out of our hair. I want to take my time with you.”

“What about all the food I just bought?” she asked with wry amusement. “And the fondue pots?”

“We’ll eat the food,” he insisted, dragging her teeth over sensitive skin, making her hips jolt against him. “We still have a receipt for the pots.”

She sighed. It was tempting, she wouldn’t deny that. But Rey could wait.

“No such luck,” she replied, pinching his side. “I’m not going to half-ass this. It’s too important, you _know_ that.”

He did a poor job of hiding his disappointment but he let her drop to her feet and grabbed the conditioner.

 

* * *

 

Ben was shredding gruyere when there was a knock at the door, earlier than expected. He nearly knicked his knuckles on the grater in surprise and helplessly, he glanced over at Rey. She was cutting the beef tenderloin into cubes and returned his look with one that clearly said, _well, I’m not going to get it._

He frowned.

“My hands are bloody,” she told him before he could argue. “It might be Hux.”

It wasn’t much of a comfort. Pursing his lips in defeat, he threw back his shoulders and made for the door.

It wasn’t Hux.

Finn stood at the front, flanked by Dameron and the short one that refused to look at him. _Wonderful_. This was going to be more awkward than he anticipated.

Still, this needed to happen if he and Rey were going to have a normal relationship. That was the only reason he stepped aside, opening the door wider to allow the trio entrance. At least their apartment had an open concept so when they entered, they were instantly drawn to where Rey stood in the kitchen area.

“When do we get a tour?” Dameron asked her without skipping a beat. “I want to see everything.”

“How about some wine?” Ben asked back with a flat voice. He hadn’t considered giving anyone a tour of their home and he certainly didn’t want Dameron seeing his _bed_. That was private. It was bad enough Rose had seen their room. While they were naked in it.

The memory had him scowling.

“Oh,” Finn uttered. “We didn’t realize you’d be sticking around.”

Great. Fantastic. Ben was so glad they’d decided to do this. At least if they had met somewhere else, there would be less doubt that he was supposed to be there and it wouldn’t feel so much like they were being invaded.

He wasn’t even conscious of the way his hands tightened into fists until Rey called his name in that tender way she used when they were alone. He wasn’t sure he was ready for people to know anymore.

“Ben, do you mind grabbing the glasses?”

He released his fingers, nodding. She had finished with the tenderloin and was washing her hands in the sink. Dameron and Rose, with linked arms, gravitated towards her but Finn watched him with a bewildered expression. Ben could feel it on his back as he moved around the island to reach the into the cabinet over the stove top. Along with five glasses, he snatched the bottle opener as well.

“Merlot or Chardonnay?” he quietly inquired.

Ben could at least attempt politeness, even if their guests wouldn’t.

Now Dameron was staring at him too, as if Ben was a jumbled puzzle he couldn’t quite piece together.

He was strangely thankful that Rose nervously lifted her palm. “I’d like some Chardonnay, please.”

He poured her a glass, setting it on the counter in front of her to avoid the chance of their fingers brushing.

Rey shot him a shy smile. “You know what I like.”

Ben felt the corners of his lips curving upwards. He did know, and in the next moment, he was opening a bottle of Merlot. She was picking up what was left of the gruyere to be shredded, gripping the grater handle to steady it as she finished the job for him.

Uncertain, Finn and then Dameron both accepted wine.

To his surprise, it seemed to be going relatively well. Rey caught her friends up with little, life details they weren’t privy to now that she no longer lived with them and Ben bustled about, placing the fondue pot of peanut oil out on the table to begin heating before grabbing vegetables and cubes of crusty, sourdough bread to arrange them in an organized circle around the center.

It reminded him vaguely of the dinner parties his mother had put on when he was a child. He had preferred to stay in the background then, and Ben couldn’t say he’d changed much.

They hadn’t discussed when they would announce the fact they were dating but as Rey and her friends made easy conversation and the wine flowed, he was beginning to feel less worried. Ben was reminded why Dameron had so many friends--he was an easy guy to like.

Rey was a little more handsy when she had alcohol but if anyone noticed the way their fingers would graze one another from behind the kitchen counter, they didn’t mention it. She was smiling in a way that seemed indefinite, dimples forming little divots in her cheeks.

He loved her. She loved him. Perhaps it would be so bad.

When Finn excused himself to go use the bathroom, Ben didn’t think to direct him down the hall and to the right. Rey was giggling with Rose over some inside joke, undoubtedly at the expense of either Dameron or Finn and he was mixing the last of the cheese into the fondue. As far as he knew, everything was fine.

Instead, Finn opened the first door on the left.

Between Ben and Rey, they owned a rather impressive collection of books. The several boxes of her books had made their way upstairs to line the new shelves he had placed next to his own and the reading desk he had once kept had been sold to make space. Their library was an innocuous room, to say the least.

Except, of course, it meant there was only one bedroom in their apartment actually being used for sleeping.

Ben turned away from the stove in time to see Finn’s confusion.

“Where does Rey sleep?”

His heart sank into his stomach with the weight of a brick.

Rey exhaled a short, uneasy, “Oh.”

Ben almost wondered if she had forgotten the purpose of this dinner party. If she couldn’t, he supposed it fell on him to say something. Taking a steadying breath, he stepped closer to her, pressing his palm to the small of her back.

“With me,” he replied with a level tone.

He assumed that was all he needed to say. It should have made the situation fairly clear, he thought.

Ben was wrong.

In an instant, Dameron had hurried to tear her away, pulling Rey behind him to act as a physical barrier. “I knew it! I knew something was off. I _knew_ we shouldn’t have let her come here, that you couldn’t be trusted to keep your hands to yourself.”

 _“Poe!”_ Rey gasped.

“Don’t worry,” Finn told her, “We’ll take you home, and--”

“Her home is _here,”_ Ben growled.

Dameron scowled back at him. “She belongs with us, away from creeps like you.”

“You don’t even know me--”

“You were a creep in high school, slinking around corners dressed like a gothic unabomber, and you’re a creep now, preying on Rey--”

“Enough!” Rey shouted. “Just stop it!”

She ripped herself away, seething. “I’m not some helpless little girl that needs protecting, least of all from my own boyfriend!”

Ben loved when she was angry. He loved the furious curl of her upper lip and how her eyebrows scrunched together in a harsh line. He almost said as much, nearly tipped towards her to kiss the snarl on her face. Instead, he met her glare with a dopey grin.

They stared at Rey, stunned.

“Boyfriend,” Finn repeated as if he was testing the way the word sounded. “Kylo Ren is your boyfriend.”

Fresh frustration flooded his chest. “That isn’t my name. I haven’t gone by that since I was twenty, for fuck’s sake!”

Dameron made a point of ignoring Ben. “Why...would you date him? After everything I’ve told you--”

“So he was a dick in high school!” She snapped back. From what? From what he told me, you were too! I’m capable of forming my own opinions about people and the Ben I know is sweet and caring and--”

He looked away, his cheeks warming. “Rey, you’re wasting your breath. Dameron doesn’t care about anyone that isn’t like him.”

Dameron’s back straightened. “That isn’t true. And I _wasn’t_ a dick in high school.”

Ben snorted. “Right. You’re going to tell me you’re _not_ the one that started calling me Cry-lo Ren behind my back.”

At least he had the decency to look somewhat ashamed. He didn’t try to deny it.

Ben ran his fingers through his hair, a growl caught in his chest. “That isn’t even the point,” he said. “I don’t care about what happened when we were stupid kids. The reason we had you all come here tonight is because Rey shouldn’t have to keep our relationship a secret from the people she cares about. I don’t really care what you think but for whatever reason, she _does_. It’s her you’re hurting, not me.”

Finn spoke slowly. “How long have you been seeing him?”

She deflated, and Ben opened his arms to her. She pushed through Finn and Poe, who could only watch as she buried her face in the collar of his shirt.

“Almost two years,” she admitted.

 

* * *

 

Two years was a long time be in a relationship with someone without telling a soul. Rey felt that keenly as she breathed in the warmth of Ben’s skin, spicy and sharp with cologne. She felt deprived when she pushed away.

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Finn asked, hurt bleeding into his tone.

What could Rey say that could make up for two years of lies? The relationship had been delicate in the beginning, vulnerable. She hadn’t been ready for their confrontation, knowing it could cause everything she wanted with Ben to crumble under her feet.

Then she remembered the reason why she’d felt it was necessary to hide everything from them. Rey bristled in defense.

“What was I supposed to do? Tell you guys and have to listen to you trash my boyfriend at every chance? You’re bad enough as it is. _Why_ would I want that?”

“Rey--” Poe tried to interject.

“When will you realize that I’m not some damsel in distress! I’ve looked after myself for my entire life!”

Her chest was heaving and when Ben tried to lay a hand on her shoulder, she rolled it off. Frustration boiling over the top, Rey didn’t want to calm down. She’d been calm about this for much too long and now she was going to speak her mind.

“What happens when we get married? When we have a baby? Am I just supposed to keep my life split in halves? I don’t know if I can do that!”

She hadn’t told Ben that she planned to be his wife, one day. He hadn’t known she wanted his babies--all curly, black hair and wide smiles and rosy cheeks and oversized ears--one day. They lived together though. And he did know she wanted a family.

Finn’s voice sounded thin. “You’re _engaged?”_

As if it would be such a terrible thing. She nearly snapped yes, out of spite.

“No,” Ben answered in a clipped tone.

Rey didn’t shake him off when a possessive hand latched onto her hip, warmth suffusing through the thin material of her summer dress. His touch grounded her, just as she knew it would.

He continued with squared shoulders. “Not yet.”

A private smile tipped the corners of her lips up. Not yet. What he meant was _eventually_.

She sighed. Rey knew her friends cared about her--perhaps to the point of being ridiculous. A small part of her found it endearing that they were so desperate to see her comfortable and happy. She had to be straightforward with them.

“The point is, Ben isn’t going anywhere. He’s an important part of my life and I want you to at least _try_ to be decent to each other.” She pursed her lips, poking Ben’s ribs. “That includes you.”

He grumbled. “I know.”

Finn and Poe were looking at her with twin expressions of shock. To their left, Rose’s shoulders slumped.

Poe ran his hand through his curling locks. “You know what, I’m really sorry Rey, but I don’t think I--” he glanced at Finn and Rose, _“--we_ should stay for dinner. We’ll call you later, okay?”

Ben’s fingers were solid on her hip but a chill slipped down her spine regardless. Numbed, she nodded her head. Rey knew they must have been hurt that she hadn’t trusted them to share about Ben but that didn’t stop the twisting ache in her gut.

Rose shot her a fleeting look, as if there was something she wanted to say, but she thought better of it, following Finn and Poe to the door.

Her chest tightened uncomfortably, eyes stinging as she turned into Ben’s waiting arms.

“This was a bad idea,” she mumbled into the collar of his shirt. “I should have listened to you when you suggested we go to a restaurant.”

Ben huffed out his nose, flooding the crown of her head with warmth. “This isn’t your fault, sweetheart.”

Rey shook her head, croaking a broken laugh. He was too generous with her. “Yes, it is.”

Ben offered no further argument, knowing that disagreeing wouldn’t help. Instead, he stood with her between the kitchen and the table, his hands running up and down her back. When Hux knocked on their door fifteen minutes later, Rey extracted herself from Ben’s delicious warmth, forcing a smile she didn’t feel.

“Invite him in, I’d hate for all this food to go completely to waste,” she told him. “I’ll just read in bed for a bit and turn in early. Leave the dishes in the sink, I’ll take care of them in the morning.”

“Rey--”

She wordlessly interrupted him, rising to the balls of her feet to cover his soft, downturned lips with her own.

“I’m okay,” she promised.

Ben didn’t buy it. She hardly sounded convincing.

 

* * *

 

“There’s mascara on your shirt,” Hux said, the moment Ben opened the door. Blinking, he glanced down to his chest to find two smears of black, diluted by tears. “I take it the announcement didn’t go well, then.”

It went about as well as Ben had expected. Better, even, considering the fact that no one had started throwing their fists around.

He stepped aside with a grimace, though he’d much rather turn Hux right around and send him on his way. He didn’t _care_ if the stupid fondue went to waste. Ben just wanted to follow her into their joint library and coil his arms around her slender waist, to push her loose hair over one shoulder and dip his mouth down to tease the sensitive, short hairs at the nape of her neck. He wanted to curl around her little figure in bed and wipe away the swirling thoughts from her head, to assure her that she wasn’t alone.

“Her friends decided to leave,” Ben murmured back.

Hux looked wholly unsurprised. “I can see that.”

Hux was not a visitor that required unnecessary pleasantries to make himself feel perfectly at home. He marched himself directly to the kitchen, retrieved a wine glass, then snatched the half empty bottle of Chardonnay from the counter. With a poise he could never emulate, Hux sat at the table, the chair turned away at an angle so he could cross one leg over the other. Ben sank into his seat, defeated.

“Welcome to dating,” Hux said in a flat tone, raising his glass.

He answered with an irritable grunt, snatching his own glass to finish it in a gagging swallow. He didn’t have the energy to point out that he’d been dating Rey for quite some time, now.

It was with a pink face and puffy eyes that Rey peeked out from the library. When the rest of her came into view, a new sense of foreboding gripped Ben: a tattered, well-loved paperback copy of _Wuthering Heights_ was tucked against her chest, as if the book could shield her from the threats of the world.

His empty wine glass clinked on the tabletop as he roughly set it down and Ben stumbled to his feet.

 _Wuthering Heights_ was her sad book. She’d had the same copy since she’d been fifteen and living in a foster home. When she had escaped London to go to NYU, it was one of the few personal belongings that she had scrambled to bring with her. Rey had read it once in the span of their relationship, on her twenty-fourth birthday. Twenty years to the day after her cocaine-addled mother had dropped her outside a fire brigade station, promising to return.

Swearing to himself, he buried his face in the crook of her neck before lifting her clear off the floor.

Startled, Rey squawked, automatically throwing an arm around his neck to keep steady. “Ben! I told you, I’m fi--”

“You’re not,” he interrupted.

“What about your friend--”

“Fuck Hux.”

There was an indelicate snort from the table. “I’ll pass, thanks.”

If there was one good thing about Hux, it was that he always knew when to make an exit. Of course, one bad thing about Hux was that he couldn’t ever do this without alerting everyone in his vicinity.

Snidely, he continued. “I’m taking the bottle with me.”

As if Ben cared one _jot_ if he took the wine with him. Hell, Hux could take the fucking fondue pots and dump their contents in the street, for all he cared.

He heard the subtle clicks of the door shutting and the latch bolt sliding into place and knew they were alone once more. Ben had to fix this but how was beyond him.

“Go put something comfortable on and crawl into bed,” he told her, pressing a firm kiss to the flat stretch of her forehead. “I’ll be right there.”

Helplessly, Ben realized there was only so much he could do to make her feel better. He locked the front door and set a kettle onto the stove top, rushing around the kitchen to clear away the disastrous dinner party. In the morning he would wash out the fondue pots and return them but for the moment, they sat in the sink basin to soak overnight.

The whistle blew and Ben dropped a bag of Yorkshire into Rey’s mug before pouring water over it. He moved the bag around with a spoon, hurrying along the steeping process. After three minutes on the microwave clock, he scooped the bag from the tea and crushed it against the side of the mug with the concave side of the spoon, just as he had seen Rey do hundreds of times over. Only after adding a splash of milk did he venture into their bedroom.

She was a ball under the comforter, facing away from him with her hair spilled over her pillow, the light on her side switched on. He stepped silently around the bed to her side, setting the mug of tea onto the bedside table. Rey was reading, her expression frighteningly blank. Her gaze flickered up at him, and for a brief moment, her despondency showed.

Ben slumped to his knees beside her. “Sweetheart,” he whispered, “It’s not _Wuthering Heights_ bad, is it?”

She frowned. “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

He brushed away the waves of brown hair that were falling in her eyes. “It’s what you read when you’re in the depths of despair.”

She wanted to smile, he could see the corner of her mouth twitch. His Rey with an “e.”

“It’s my favorite book,” she argued.

Ben bit his tongue. He was sure she _thought_ that. Either way, he wasn’t going to push Rey. With a sigh, he pushed back to his feet, shuffling around her huddled form to settle behind her.

The hand holding up her book trembled, causing the words to wobble out of focus. He reached over her to snatch it from her fingers then gently place it next to her tea. She sniffled, head ducking forward, and Rey wriggled under the blankets for a few, feeble seconds.

“I hate it when you do that,” she grumbled.

His chest tightened. “What?”

She was pouting, he could hear it in her tone. “When you lay on top of the blankets and trap me.”

He puffed a short laugh. “I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I CANNOT BELIEVE I CONTINUED THIS.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has taken me SO LONG to update this...and I literally wrote everything sentences at a time. Between two jobs and 12 credits, I've been a busy bee the past few months. Thank you for your patience!

When Ben woke, it was to a faint buzzing sound. Rey made a sleepy grunt, burrowing herself closer to him, her knees pulled up to her chest and her shins against his stomach. He pushed up to his elbows, bleary as he blinked at her vibrating phone. Next to it sat her half-empty cup of tea and _Wuthering Heights_. A bookmark protruded from the yellowed pages, about a centimeter down from the top cover. She must have stayed up after he fell asleep.

The buzzing mercifully came to a halt and Ben slumped back into his pillow, content to stay in bed.

After a few seconds, it started again.

_Fine_. Not wanting to wake her, he slipped out from under the sleep-warm blankets, snatching her phone and carrying it to the other room. Ben had intended to leave it on the table and return to bed, but then he read the name lighting up her screen in white lettering, _Rose Tico._

It was eight in the morning on a Saturday. What could she want?

Ben wasn’t quite sure why he did it, but in a flash of hot anger, he swiped his thumb across the screen and brought Rey’s phone up to his ear.

“What?” he snapped.

There was a moment of silence, then:

“You aren’t Rey.”

No, shit.

“She’s asleep,” Ben replied evenly.

Another weighted pause.

At length, she said, “Actually, this might be better. Are you doing anything this afternoon?”

Ben sputtered. His only plan for the day was to cheer up Rey.

“Meet me at Maz’s at two. It’s on thirteenth and--”

Irritation instantly broiled under his skin. “I know where Maz’s is.”

He should, considering he had gone there with Rey on the day they met. And his father had been a regular almost up to the day his chain-smoking did him in.

Rose’s voice was upbeat in a way that was difficult to be annoyed with. “Thanks, Ben. I’ll see you then.”

The line went dead and Ben gaped at the black screen.

What the hell?

He doesn’t think he actually _agreed_ to meet her. Ben could easily blow her off. Yet, when he stalked back into the bedroom and returned Rey’s phone to the nightstand, gazing down at her sleeping form, he knew he would. If he could talk some sense into one of her chucklehead friends, Rose seemed the most likely. She at least had the decency to call him by his name, for fuck’s sake.

Slowly, Ben sank back into bed, throwing his arm around her. She made a quiet, snuffling noise, drawn to his body heat. Rey was so susceptible to chills.

He pushed back her hair, brushing his mouth over the high slope of her cheek.

They had met on a similar Saturday in September, in a used bookshop. She had been so hyper-focused on her search through the stacks that she hadn’t seen Ben and had run, quite literally, into him. Rey had laughed through her apology and it had irritated Ben, but then she had beamed up at him and apologized again, telling him, _I have no idea how I didn’t see you standing there when you’re a literal giant._

She had been looking for the 1817 edition of _Frankenstein_ and Ben had raised his brow at that. He had felt like an ass for assuming she had been in for a used copy of one of the _Fifty Shades_ novels and he silently made amends by helping her look to no avail. Only the later editions were available.

When he’d asked her to tea, she had giggled, his cheeks flushing vividly as she wondered aloud, _Are you asking me because of the accent?_ Admittedly, he had been. She had winked when he scrambled to reply, informing him that if she saw his pinky in the air even once, she’d tease him without mercy.

Maz’s was an eccentric place, with sugary, blended coffees and carajillos and afternoon tea, complete with finger sandwiches and buttermilk scones. It hadn’t made sense to Ben as a boy and it still didn’t make sense to him now, but far be it from him to complain about the unconventional menu. The patrons were a mixed bag as well and he supposed that was why his father had enjoyed the place--that, and the thought of having anisette in his espresso.

Having tea became going to dinner the next Friday...and breakfast the Saturday following. Ben wasn’t sure where her friends thought she had been if not with a man, all the nights she had spent over at his apartment.

Ben continued to comb through her hair, flat from being slept on, with his fingers. He wasn’t entirely sure what he had done to deserve her; in an instant, he remembered what she had said the night before.

Rey expected to marry him. More than that, she expected to have a _baby_ with him. He hadn’t hoped to think such a future could be possible. His hand brushed down the delicate stretch of her neck, slipping below the blankets to follow the length of her arm before flattening over her belly in awe.

For a moment, Ben pretended she was already pregnant, his fingers creeping under her shirt to find her hot skin. Too soon for her middle to expand, their baby--a girl, he imagined, with her mother’s bright smile and round, hazel eyes--grew in the dark safety of her womb. His thumb slowly strummed her navel as he pictured Rey swollen and grumpy but so, so happy at the same time.

With a private grin, Ben then imagined getting her pregnant. His hand drifted decidedly lower, gliding under her sleep bottoms to gently run a finger along her slit. She was dry and sure to wake if he tried to retrieve his hand and wet it with his tongue, so he circled the rough pad of his thumb over clit.

_“Mmph.”_

Rey shifted, legs parting to make room for his hand, her backside nudging at his crotch. She hadn’t woken. Her irises were still flitting back and forth behind her eyelids. He pursed his lips to prevent a ridiculous smile from stretching across his face, then ducked his chin into the delicate curve where her neck met her shoulder, his nose nuzzling her cheek.

A shiver crept down the length of her body, her breath hitching. When Rey rolled her hips against him again, he knew it was deliberately done. She hissed as he scraped his teeth along her throat.

“Good morning,” he mumbled, nipping over the ridge of her jawline to find her mouth.

_“Ben,”_ she whined, turning her head away, “I have morning breath.”

He ground himself into her bottom, hardening. “So do I.”

Ben pulled her to lay flat on her back, retrieving his hand from between her thighs, the point of his knee drawing up to replace it. She gasped at the sudden pressure and he took full advantage, his chest rumbling with a guttural sound as he dove towards her mouth.

“Ben!” she laughed, swatting his chest. He didn’t care if their breath was stale or if the corners of their eyes were still crusty from sleep or if their hair was greasy.

She was beautiful, even first thing in the morning.

 

* * *

 

It was still a strange thing, to be in Ben’s apartment while he was elsewhere. Of course, it was no longer just _Ben’s_ apartment. It was _theirs_.

He had scampered off after lunch in a hurry, mumbling about errands as he went.

Rey was thankful. Ben had been fretful all morning and as much as she appreciated the novelty of his concern, she needed a break from his tiptoeing. He just wanted to make her happy, and Rey understood that, but the ridiculous man was treating her like she was splintering glass.

She sighed, shuffling into the bathroom on socked feet.

She and Ben couldn’t comfortably fit in the bathtub together; early on in the relationship, he had set out candles and put bubbles and fancy oils into the water, only to turn out the lights, stumble into the tub, and half crush her. They had splashed about a little until Rey had slid into his lap and ridden him to wild completion, more water on the floor than in the tub.

Rey plugged the drain and twisted the faucet, hot water bubbling from the spout. She thought of how Ben had woken her, sturdy fingers working between her thighs, lips chapped as they moved from her mouth down the sinewy length of her body. He’d tasted her with extra enthusiasm, twisting an orgasm from her with his tongue before Ben had covered her with his body and his cock slid _home_.

Logically, she knew this would blow over. Her friendship with Finn, Poe, and Rose wasn’t so fragile that her relationship with Ben could destroy it.

_Yet_...Rey couldn’t silence the sneering voice that wrapped itself around her skull.

What if it did?

She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to decide between the family she had chosen for herself and the one she wanted to build. Finn was the first friendly face she had met after leaving London. In some ways, Rey considered him her first friend, period. She might have given up and returned to the UK if she hadn’t met him. Rey would have gone an entire lifetime without knowing any of the people she loved now if it weren’t for meeting Finn.

The thought of losing all that had her eyes swimming.

But did that mean she had to sacrifice what she had with Ben? The idea was inconceivable.

He was more than family to Rey. Ben was _part_ of her. He was in her veins and the marrow of her bones, between her teeth and woven through her hair. Ben was under her nails and caught in the back of her throat. There was no escaping how she felt for him.

Tears spilled over, dribbling to her chin as she watched the bath fill.

Rey had thought she finally had everything a normal person did. Her family was small and unrelated by blood but they were _hers_. Ben loved her, enough to compromise his own happiness.

She felt like a monster. She should never have asked him to keep their relationship a secret when all it had accomplished was causing him pain. All the times she had told Ben that she loved him, had he doubted? Rey already knew he didn’t think he deserved to be with her. She wanted to tell him it was the other way around.

There had to have been something wrong with her. When Ben figured that out, he’d leave her, too.

After all, it’s what everyone else did.

When the tub came close to overflowing, Rey yanked out the stopper to watch the water drain.

 

* * *

 

When Ben reached Maz’s, Rose had already arrived and was sitting at a small, round table, sipping on a fruit infused iced tea. He ordered an espresso but waited for it at the bar counter, only approaching the table once he had his coffee and could think of no other reason to avoid it.

He sat in the chair opposite of Rose and smoothly said, “She started reading _Wuthering Heights_ last night.”

The young woman had been preparing a speech of some kind and his comment threw her off--Rose deflated with confusion. “Huh?”

It occurred to Ben that she might not _know_. Perhaps none of her friends did.

He was reminded then of the first time he’d caught her crying late at night when she’d thought he was asleep. Rey had flinched away, had apologized for waking him with a fervency that bordered delirium.

No, he realized. They couldn’t have known. Not about the gnawing insecurity that sometimes plagued her, about the way she curled into herself to hide from her hurts. Suddenly, he wanted to be far from there, back with Rey so he could engulf her with the span of his arms and hold her so close she no longer had room to feel alone.

“It’s what she reads when she’s upset,” he answered quietly. “She’ll tell you it’s her favorite book, but it’s not.”

Rose didn’t seem to know what to say. “What is her favorite, then?”

Ben smiled to himself. _“Pride and Prejudice,_ though she’s too embarrassed to ever admit it,” he paused at her continued bewilderment and added, “Everyone is happy in the end. Everyone who should be, at least. Lady Catherine can sod off.”

He cleared his throat, feeling uncomfortable. “At least, that’s what she says.”

Rose met his gaze. “You’re different than I expected,” she admitted.

He could have been snarky. _I’m sure Dameron isn’t the same prick he was in high school, either._ Instead, he held his tongue.

A tense moment passed and Ben had to ask, “Why did you want to meet me here?”

She sat up straighter, glancing about the cafe. “It’s a rather unique--”

“I know. Rey and I had our first date here.”

He didn’t mention the fact that he’d been coming to Maz’s since he was a boy. That it had been his father’s stomping grounds, once. He could still taste the vanilla milkshakes Maz would make him (they had been off menu; she had pitied the gangly boy that had followed his father’s shadow through questionably reputable establishments), it was odd to think that Rey had brought her friends here, to a place from his boyhood. Even without meaning to, she was sharing parts of him with other people. The intimacy of it warmed his chest in a way he hadn’t expected.

“Oh,” she mumbled.

Ben hummed, glancing down at the dissolving circle of foam that had formed around the shape of his espresso cup. His fingers were almost too wide around to slip through the handle when he took a sip of bitter coffee, letting the drink linger on his tongue for a few seconds before swallowing.

“I don’t mean to be rude--” well, that wasn’t completely true, “--but what do you want?”

She took a sip of her own drink, regarding him thoughtfully.

“To understand what the hell is going on,” she answered frankly. “Last night was a disaster. Poe is probably the nicest, most accepting person I know, I’ve never seen him act like that.”

Ben rolled his eyes.

“You should ask him, then,” he said.

She squared her shoulders, a spark of stubbornness all of Rey’s friends seemed to possess flashing across her face. “I need to hear your side of it.”

Ben leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms as he considered her. “I don’t really see how that’s my problem.”

Rose huffed, irritated. “Don’t you want to fix this? We’re Rey’s friends, and that isn’t going to change anytime soon. I thought you cared about--”

“I _love_ her,” he interrupted with a defensive snarl. Her dark eyes widened with surprise. “I was trying to fix this last night, when I let you and the idiot duo into our home. Instead, I had to watch her heart break as you all abandoned her--just as she feared you would if she told the truth about our relationship. Don’t you _dare_ try to imply that I don’t care about Rey.”

Rose took a deep, fortifying breath. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t what I was trying to say.”

He exhaled shortly, reaching for his espresso.

Ben hadn’t come here to chastise her--he barely knew her and she was hardly worth the energy--but he felt better for saying it. Still, Rose wasn’t to blame. Not really.

He ran a hand through his hair, long fingers pushing it out of his face.

“Look,” he sighed, “I didn’t agree to meet you so I could be an asshole and tear your head off.”

Lips pursed in a thin line, she inclined her head once.

“If clearing the air won’t help, what do you suggest we do?” she asked.

Ben hated that she had a point. There was nothing else _to_ do. He grimaced, sinking further into his seat, dread swarming his throat.

“What do you want to know?”

 

* * *

 

Rey didn’t move at the telltale clicks of the deadbolt being unlocked by a key. She hadn’t taken a bath and was still wearing the same pajamas from last night, her greasy hair tight in a bun at the top of her head. The television was on to reruns of _Friends_ on TBS, but she wasn’t really watching, lost in her blissfully thoughtless mind.

Ben said nothing as he walked through the door and locked it again, silent as he marched into the living room and sagged to his knees where her head rested on the couch pillow. There was something weary in his expression that told her he had gone out for more than just errands.

Feeling grimy, wishing he couldn’t see her like this, Rey closed her eyes as his palm rested on her cheek.

She thought she had already run out of tears but when his chapped lips pecked the tip of her nose, her eyes started to burn once more.

“Please don’t cry, sweetheart,” he whispered, sounding helpless. “I promise it’ll work out.”

Rey sniffled. “I’m sorry.”

He shook his head, hand moving from her cheek down the dips and curves of her side to settle on her hip. Ben tasted like bitter coffee when she jerked her chin forward to capture his mouth and his fingers squeezed tighter, as if to convey the depth of his feelings without words. He gently dragged his lips away, breathing shallow.

“I met with your friend, Rose,” he admitted, voice roughened.

She blinked up at him dumbly. “Why would you do that?”

Ben snorted, not wholly surprised by her bluntness. “I’m at least partially to blame for how it went last night. I have to make this right.”

She shook her head in disbelief. How could he believe he was to blame for what had happened? Ben had done everything right--had been calm and polite despite how irritated he must have felt. He had _tried,_ so hard.

“Ben--”

Rey wasn’t sure how to tell him, _no. This is my fault._

He shushed her before she got the chance, his tone edging on frantic. “Sweetheart, it’s okay.”

He gathered her into his arms and Rey tried to shake her head, her vision blurring.

The cuffs of his tee shirt sleeve stretched around his biceps as he squeezed her tighter. She leaned her cheek against his firm shoulder, staring at her finger as she traced a constellation of dark beauty marks on his inner forearm. Ben must have felt the trickle of tears soaking into his shirt but he said nothing, fingers gently rubbing her narrow back.

Shame bloomed in her chest, that Ben had to see her like this.

“I’m going to fix this,” he whispered. “I’ll fix everything.”

_Oh, Ben._ There was nothing to fix.

Whatever could have broken in her had been missing from the start.

That had to be the reason everyone she’s ever come to care for left her in the end. She dreaded the day Ben left her, too.

 

* * *

 

She was forlorn at best and all Ben wanted was to drag her into bed and curl himself around her so she could forget, even momentarily, that a world beyond their own existed.

Rehashing what had happened between him and Dameron had been a more exhausting ordeal than Ben could have anticipated. Rose Tico may have _looked_ sweet and small and harmless but it had not taken him very long to learn that she didn’t take no for an answer.

She hadn’t accepted his surface-level explanations, demanding the absolute truth. So, Ben told her everything.

He told her about the summer his parents had separated, when he had lived with his Uncle Luke in Boston. He told her about returning home to find half of the house--everything that had belonged to his father--missing. He told her about the time he had hopped onto a Greyhound that had snaked through Connecticut, Massachusetts, then the low corner of New Hampshire before he’d gotten off in northern Vermont. He told her about the week he had spent hiding in the woods, catching squirrels and rabbits using traps his father had taught him to set and waiting for the leaves to turn.

Every autumn, on the third weekend of October, his family had taken a short road trip to Vermont to see the vibrant spectrum of amber to maroon, lighting the woods with a wildfire that wouldn’t burn. One day every year, their small, dysfunctional family had spent together admiring the trees and eating smoked cheddar and chocolate cigars from the Old Country Store. There had been only a single rule: no arguing. His parents had always bickered on the way home, when they thought Ben was fast asleep in the back seat.

He told her about the rage and rejection that had alternated in painful bouts, that his father had disappeared without telling Ben where he was going and whether or not he intended to come back, without even saying _goodbye_.

He told her about the way Dameron had changed too, a new cluster of friends surrounding him after the long summer apart. Ben told her exactly what he had told him all those years ago--that he didn’t need friends. Least of all ones that were hopped up on steroids just so they could get on the JV football team. Ben had known it wasn’t true, even as the scathing accusation had shot from his mouth, but something within Dameron had run cold. A year after that, Ben had become absorbed in theater and they were at each other’s throats.

Now his father was dead. They had never really reconciled. Ben wasn’t sure how to forgive his father after the fact, or even how to let go of the heavy stone that dropped into his gut whenever he thought about him. It would be easier to pretend he never had a father at all, but for all his skills as an actor, Ben couldn’t do it.

Rey was the only person he had ever shared everything with. She had held his hand and said nothing as traitorous tears had trickled down the length of his nose, his head ducked forward so his hair fell over his face. Telling Rose had been different. His tone had been clipped, his expression carefully schooled.

Ben wasn’t sure what she planned to do with what he’d said. It was possible she would go to Dameron next to repeat his story but he wasn’t convinced it would change anything.

He sighed, lifting her legs off the couch cushions and placing them on his lap after taking a seat.

“Are you okay?” Rey whispered, neck turning slightly to glance his way.

Ben stroked her calf, humming back to her. “Yeah. I’ll be fine.”

And he would be, he knew.

Her breath caught in her throat, a small hand seeking his. Their fingers laced together, hers squeezing tight. “But you aren’t right now?”

All he could give her was a tired smile. “Your little friend is kind of nosy. She wanted to know about me and Dameron.”

Her lips parted with surprise and she flopped onto her back to stare at him. “You told Rose? What for?”

His smile eased into something more genuine.

“For you, silly.”

The expression that crossed her face betrayed full-blown panic, her eyes widening as her cheeks paled.

He felt the corners of his mouth drop. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

Rey tore her hand away, covering her eyes with the meat of both palms, her slender fingers clawing at her forehead as her bottom lip wobbled.

“I--I don’t understand why you would _do_ that. I don’t understand why you even want to be with me when all I seem to do is make you miserable.”

_What_?

Ben’s mind reeled, unable to so much as comprehend what she was saying.

“I’m not miserable,” he said stupidly.

She barked a disbelieving laugh. Ben hated the way it sounded, so unlike the cheek-splitting snickers she usually burst with.

“I’m _not_ miserable,” he repeated with more force, snagging her wrists with one hand to tug them away from her face. “In fact, I’d say I’m pretty fucking happy at the moment.”

He wished he could take away the cruelty of her childhood, wipe away the memories of all the people who had ever made her think she didn’t deserve joy and love. He couldn’t, though. The most Ben could do was convince her of how he felt now.

“Rey,” he said, leaning closer so she couldn’t avoid his gaze. “Yesterday, I found out the woman I love wants to marry me. She wants to make babies with me. Do you have any idea how happy that makes me?”

Her face flushed brilliant red and Ben wondered if she had forgotten what she had said.

“You do want that, don’t you?”

He wasn’t sure what he would do if she didn’t.

“Yes,” she exhaled, too embarrassed to look anywhere but at the tip of his nose. “I’m not sure when, and I probably shouldn’t have just blurted it out like that without ever talking to you about it, but yes. I want that with you. I want _everything_ with you.”

Ben grinned. _“Everything,_ huh?”

He tilted forward to peck her lips.

“So, you’ll still want me when my hair is white and I’m wrinkly all over and I can’t get my dick up without a blue pill?”

She groaned, slapping his chest. “Did you have to put it like that?”

“Well, I figure I should be realistic about it,” he chuckled, kissing the skin along the collar of her shirt. “Growing old together, I mean.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I just wanted to say something about how I've written Rey in this fic. I've been struggling with depression for thirteen years. Sometimes I'm okay. But it doesn't take much to send me spiraling, and then I'll be in the "depths of despair." (I wasn't sure if anyone got that or the "Rey with an e" reference in the previous chapter, but I just HAD to. I adore Anne of Green Gables.) That is what inspired her characterization and why she goes from happily moving in with Ben to a weepy mess that disassociates while watching the bathtub fill. I'm not really expecting everyone who reads this fic to appreciate how I've characterized her, all I ask is that you be...gentle with whatever criticism you might have. Somehow, this has become a deeply personal work (I guess that happens when you decide to write a silly secret-dating fic but you've actually dated someone in secret before lmao). This has been OVERSHARING WITH HT, now back to our regular broadcasting.
> 
> Another note: I used to drive to Vermont every October when I was little. And the best part was going to the country store (SMOKED CHEESE!!! GIANT BARRELS OF CANDY!!!! It was a child's paradise). And the Yankee store. And the diner in Massachusetts that apparently sucks now. And the pumpkin patches. Okay, so I loved the whole thing. I'm upset that I wasn't able to make the trip this year.
> 
> Anyway, thank you for reading! Feedback is greatly appreciated. :)


	4. Chapter 4

Ben woke with a purpose. He knew Rey wouldn’t want him to go off on his own again, that she hoped to be involved in fixing the mess with Dameron, but ultimately, it wasn’t her mess to clean. Dameron’s grudge was against him, not Rey. He had to be the one mend things.

He had hardly realized what he was preparing for until he was crouched down to tie his boots.

Rey took his hand at the door. “You don’t have to do this for me.”

Ben smiled, a new wave of exhaustion crashing on his shoulders. He tipped her chin up and stared into her vivid, hazel eyes, wide with concern.

“Yes, I do,” he whispered.

She tried to smile back but Ben could tell her heart wasn’t in it.

“I love you,” he reminded her, and to answer, she surged onto her toes to crush their lips together.

“I know you do,” she breathed, sinking back onto her heels, hands stroking down his chest. “Please, just...don’t exasperate the situation. Or let him talk over you. Or--”

“It’ll be fine,” he assured her.

Maybe if he said that often enough, it would become true.

Ben knew he would probably regret not driving later, but he needed to clear his head and dealing with morning traffic wouldn’t help.

The morning air was crisp, the beginnings of autumn hanging in the breeze as it ruffled his hair. Soon enough, he would need a jacket on early walks like this. Ben hoped that Rey had returned to bed; her bookmark had shifted deeper into _Wuthering Heights_ at some point between when he had fallen asleep and when the sun had woke him.

All he could picture was Rey huddled under the comforter, his useless, snoring form a giant lump beside her.

He should have waited for her to drift off before allowing himself to succumb to slumber. He should have whispered silly sweet nothings into her hair until they permeated her dreams or better yet, Ben should have exhausted her, made her feel so cherished that she glowed.

But his own mind had been swirling with memories he had thought were long at rest. His father hadn’t felt so close in years, perhaps not since the day he had stood over his grave. Most mourners left well before the casket was lowered into the ground but Ben had waited as if some twisted part of him needed to be sure that his father didn’t take advantage of his last chance to run away. For once, Han Solo would stay put--six feet of earth would see to _that._

His boots felt heavy as Ben marched up the stairs of Rey’s old apartment building but he trudged upwards, each step more difficult to take than the last.

What was he doing? If he hadn’t been able to reconcile with Dameron in the past, Ben didn’t see how it could be any different now. In fact, his chances of making amends were drastically lowered, now that he had _whisked_ Rey away like some dark interloper.

Then he remembered Rey, and how she had had him sit on the toilet and hold her hand while she was in the bath last night.

Fury crawled up his throat, his fingers curling into tight fists.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he knocked on the front door.

 

* * *

 

Rey paced the living room, bare feet slapping against hardwood.

She made a pot of coffee and stirred in a spoonful of sugar with the usual cream she added to her mug. The buttered toast she had with it scraped the roof of her mouth and she could only force down a few bites.

She sat down on the couch for a solid minute before jolting upwards again.

It was no good. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t just wait around while Ben fought her battles for her. Rey was no damsel in distress. She had slayed her dragons before, she could certainly do so now.

With a shudder, she stood up straight.

Rey didn’t so much as bother changing out of her pajama pants before snatching Ben’s keys from the hook by the door and slipping on a pair of rubber flip-flops.

_Wait for me, Ben,_ she thought, hoping somehow he would hear.

 

* * *

 

A bedraggled and half-dressed Finn answered the door. If he had been awake before Ben arrived, it hadn’t been for long.

“What the fuck?” he mumbled, eyes drifting closed.

_Nice_.

Ben scowled. “Get Dameron up or I _will_. We need to talk. Now.”

“What the fuck?” Dameron echoed tiredly, shuffling towards the door. “Who invited tall, dark, and gothic over? Doesn’t he know it’s _morning?”_

He leveled Dameron with a dangerous glare. “After how you treated Rey, do you think I _care_ what time it is? Put a shirt on, we’re going to have a chat.”

“Like hell, we are--”

He was interrupted by a much more chipper voice. “Ben, catch!”

A basketball went sailing over Dameron’s head and Ben raised his hands moments before it could slam into his face. He lowered the ball to throw a frown at the little woman who had tossed it. Rose crossed her arms, looking particularly cozy in her fluffy, floral robe.

“I don’t want to see any fist fights so deal with this like men. Go shoot some hoops.”

Ben floundered for a moment. “What--”

Rose barreled forward, shoving Dameron through the door and into Ben. “If I see any bloody noses, there will be consequences,” she promised.

The door promptly shut in their faces and Ben sighed, deflating slightly. This was not going how he’d expected it to, though he should have known it wouldn’t.

“So, you’ve turned my girlfriend against me, too?” Dameron grumbled. “She called you Ben.”

“Well, it _is_ my name,” he snarled back.

Dameron huffed, stealing the basketball to dribble it once against the carpeted hallway floor. “If the lady insists, I guess I don’t have a choice.”

Ben followed him into the elevator in silence, watching as Dameron tossed the ball back and forth between his hands, finding some small comfort in the fact that he wasn’t the only one feeling on edge.

Dameron led them through the lobby, past the wall of mailboxes to a small court behind the building. There was someone drying off by the adjacent, narrow lap pool but they were otherwise alone.

Dameron dribbled the ball again before tossing it from the three-point line with a casual ease. Unsurprisingly, the basketball made a smooth arc through the air and into the hoop. It bounced towards Ben and he grabbed it before Dameron could show off more.

Ben had never been particularly athletic growing up, despite his tall build. In middle school, the only reason he hadn’t been the last kid selected for teams in P.E. was because of his friendship with Dameron. His other teammates had always made loud complaints but Dameron had stood firm. No friend of his was going to be left out.

At least not until they became too _other_ for him to deal with.

Irritated, he tossed the ball towards the hoop, only for it to rebound off the rim. It seemed he still wasn’t much good at this.

Dameron snorted, ducking forward to catch the ball. “I see your game hasn’t improved.”

“Excuse _me_ if I have better things to do with my life than run around playing with balls,” he snapped.

He had the gall to laugh. “Still have a mouth on you, though.”

Ben pressed his lips together in a thin line. “I didn’t come here to play one-on-one.”

“Yeah,” Dameron agreed with a placid nod, “because you _suck.”_

Ben growled. _Fine_.

He lurched towards Dameron, long arms reaching for the ball. Dameron leaped back, simultaneously flinging the basketball at the hoop.

_Whoosh_.

“Nothing but net,” he crowed. “Suck on _that,_ Solo!”

They both paused. Ben blinked dumbly at him, stunned. The basketball rolled past his feet but he didn’t have the sense to grab it.

“You…” he started.

Dameron frowned. “Don’t get sappy on me now.”

It had only been a slip. Ben knew that. But somehow, it gave him the courage to swallow his pride.

“Listen, about high school...I shouldn’t have said that thing about the steroids. I was pissed off at my dad but he wasn’t there to take it out on. You were my only friend and it was shitty of me.”

“Is all that hair getting in the way of your hearing?” Dameron groused. “I said _don’t_ get sappy--”

“Too bad,” Ben grunted. “Let me apologize for being an asshole, for fuck’s sake.”

Dameron was quiet for so long Ben wondered if he’d had a stroke. It hadn’t occurred to him until then that Rose could have told him about his father leaving and the week he’d spent in Vermont. There was an understanding in his expression that Ben couldn’t quite place.

“We were both assholes in high school,” he finally said.

At least there was something they could both agree on. Ben sighed, running a trembling hand through his hair.

“At this point, it doesn’t matter to me what was said when we were dumb kids. What _does_ matter is Rey, and you broke her heart.”

Dameron’s tone was flat. “Well, the two of you shouldn’t have hidden the fact that you were dating.”

“Can you blame her for wanting to hide our relationship, considering how it turned out when we told you?” Ben snarled. “She was afraid you’d abandon her and that’s exactly what you did. What everyone has _always_ done.”

“Dramatic as usual,” Dameron griped. “We didn’t abandon--”

“Do you ever _think?”_ Ben seethed. “You three are the closest thing she has to a family! She was finally ready to share this part of her life with you and she was rejected for it. I’ve done nothing but watch her fall apart since you left our apartment. She thinks she has to choose between us and Rey doesn’t deserve that, not after all she’s been through.”

Dameron opened his mouth in shock. “She thinks... _what?”_

“I’ll fight for her if it comes to that,” Ben continued with a sharp voice--one he scarcely recognized. “If you force her to choose...I don’t care how selfish it makes me. I’m not going to give her up.”

 

* * *

 

Rey hated this. She had traded pacing in one living room for pacing in another.

“I don’t understand what’s going on,” Finn mumbled from the rim of his coffee cup. “Why do we have so many visitors?”

Rey met Rose’s gaze and they both rolled their eyes pointedly. Finn had never been much of a morning person.

“I saw that!” he said.

“Good,” Rose retorted. “You were supposed to.”

Rey giggled, shaking her head. Some things never changed and she found comfort in knowing that.

But some things _did_ change, and Rey wasn’t sure she was prepared for that. Rose seemed calm--though Rey was certain that was in part because she actually knew where Ben and Poe were--and Finn had been happy (if not a little groggy) to see her. It was as if nothing had happened. The moment Ben walked back through that door, though, it would be different. For better or worse, things would change.

Was it so greedy of her to want everyone in her little, patched-up family together?

From the kitchen, Rose called, “What does Ben like for breakfast? Are pancakes okay?”

Rey smiled. Well. It seemed everyone was just going to have to learn to get along.

“Pancakes are perfect,” she said, wandering into the kitchen on restless feet. Rey clacked her nails on the tiled countertop in an anxious beat, eyeing Rose as she crouched to search the squat refrigerator for eggs. “I should warn you though, he eats as much as a horse.”

“Maybe that’s because he’s the _size_ of a goddamn horse,” Finn chimed in from the table. “Does he ever...like, crush you?”

Rey barked a startled laugh as Rose scolded, _“Finn!”_

“Yeah,” Rey answered with a grin, “but it’s a nice sort of crushing. It feels safe, being surrounded by all those warm muscles.”

“Ew,” Finn said succulently. “I don’t want to know.”

“Then don’t ask!” Rey snickered.

Finn came stalking into the kitchen, full lips pursed in a curious frown. He perched his elbows on the counter to cradle his chin in both palms, glancing back and forth between the two women.

“Okay, but is it true...what they say about big feet? Because his are _ridiculous.”_

“Oh my god, Finn--” Rose started.

Rey flashed him a devilish smile. “Are you trying to ask me if he’s hung like a horse too?”

“What? No, _gross--”_

Rey nearly jumped when Ben’s voice sounded behind her, oddly nasal. “Are you seriously having a conversation about my dick right now?”

She whirled about, eyes blowing open wide at Ben, who’s large fingers were pinching his nostrils shut, a trickle of blood flowing from his nose and over his plump lips and the curve of his chin.

“Ben! What the hell happened?” Rey frantically slapped his hand aside to inspect the damage, her hands gently gripping either side of his jaw to turn his face. The bleeding had stopped, at least.

“I’m fine,” he mumbled, looking at his shoes to avoid meeting her gaze.

Disbelief rose to her throat before rage swept through her. “In no way is this fine! It’s the complete _opposite_ of fine--” Poe appeared next to him with a sheepish expression _“--you!_ What the fuck!”

“Rey,” Poe tried, but she wasn’t going to listen to excuses. Enough was enough.

She turned from Ben to jab a finger into Poe’s chest, unashamedly satisfied by the way he grimaced in pain. “How _dare_ you! You can dislike my boyfriend all you want but you can’t just punch him out! I should give you a bloody nose to match!”

Poe dodged backward, both hands raised in surrender. “Woah, there! It was an accident, okay--”

Rey saw red. “An accident? Are you kidding me--”

Two wide palms slid down the length of her biceps. “Sweetheart, it _was_ an accident. Please just leave it at that.”

“You’re telling me you _accidentally_ fell into his fist?!”

Poe cackled, producing a basketball with a bloody smear. “Can you believe he’s actually worse at playing ball than when he was in high school? That takes skill.”

“Oh, leave it alone, Dameron.”

Rey stared at the pair, not entirely sure of what to say. Something was offbeat between them, though their postures were far from antagonistic. She had never seen Ben look quite so...relaxed around Poe. Even without her there to force their hands, they had reached a sort of understanding. A miraculous middle ground had been found. She wanted to ask how such a thing was possible but disrupting this newfound sense of peace was not worth satisfying her curiosity.

“Fine, Solo. Next time we have an argument we’ll go sit in a library...or whatever it is you do.”

She quirked her eyebrow at that. “Solo, huh?”

Ben shot her a pleading look, _don’t ask._

Rey sighed. She was just happy to have everyone in the same room; she could leave it at that.

“Do you need to go to the hospital?” she murmured, pecking his cheek. “I drove here. I can take you.”

“It isn’t broken,” he insisted. “Just be gentle with it.”

“All right,” Rose proclaimed, clapping her hands. “Who wants bacon?”

 

* * *

 

The pancakes were eaten with gusto and Ben dragged her out the door as soon as it didn’t seem _too_ rude to leave.

“How are you?” he asked in the car, his free hand tangling with hers on her pajamaed lap.

Rey shot him a wry smile. “I should be asking you that. Does your nose still hurt?”

Ben shrugged. He hadn’t thought about it since sitting down to breakfast.

She nodded back, seemingly accepting the situation for what it was.

Neither he nor Rey knew how to proceed, now that everything was out in the open and accepted. Ben had marched over to Dameron’s expecting a fight and all the energy would have used to yell himself hoarse was bursting in his chest, waiting to be expelled. He didn’t know what to do with it, or what he was supposed to tell Rey.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about being called _Solo_. Dameron had gone mute after Ben had explained just how hurt Rey had felt, but it didn’t give him the satisfaction he had expected. As if the habit had lingered from boyhood, he had wordlessly bounced the basketball to Dameron to make a toss.

After Ben washed the blood from his face in the bathroom, he emerged to find Rey in the center of a tight group hug, sniffling. He supposed that meant everything was...okay. Or at least as _okay_ as it could be.

At the stoplight, she leaned over to press her lips to the underside of his jaw.

“It was nice to have breakfast with everyone but I think I like spending my mornings with you, in our home, more,” she confessed, staring at the dented fender of the Civic idling in front of them.

Hearing her say that was unexpectedly relieving. He squeezed her hand affectionately.

“Yeah?”

“Mmm.”

A thoughtful quiet settled once more and it remained for the entirety of their drive home. He laughed easily–-to Rey’s pointed chagrin-–as she scurried from the street to their building lobby in carmine plaid, nearly chasing her to the elevator.

She stuck her tongue out when he slipped through the closing doors _despite_ the frantic clacking of thick, plastic buttons being pushed, but once alone, Rey wrapped her arms around his neck to lead him into a filthy kiss. She tasted like Mrs. Butterworth’s and molded to him with a leg thrown over his hip.

“We’re going to be caught by Maz again,” he warned.

She licked into his mouth, grinning. “Are you that scared of being tattled on by a little, old woman?”

Ben grunted when she nipped at his lips. “You’ve never seen that wrinkled hellion angry before.”

But they weren’t caught. Not in the elevator, and not as they stumbled, scarcely able to separate themselves, down the hallway. Ben had a decent idea of how he would be expelling that excess energy.

Through the door, Rey was stripping her pajama bottoms with an enticing wiggle before he could close it behind him.

“Fuck,” he said, wetting his lips as she dipped forward to touch her toes, her white, cotton panties nearly translucent with arousal over her pink pussy. His cock twitched, trapped against his thigh in his jeans. “I love you so much.”

She laughed, straightening her back to dash towards the bedroom. “That won’t help you catch me!”

Ben growled as he gave chase, catching sight of her round backside once more as she clambered onto the bed and stood tall, a triumphant look crossing her face.

“Don’t try it,” she teased. “I have the high ground.”

He rolled his eyes, unable to hide his amusement. If she was quoting _Galaxy Wars,_ her mood was much improved. Shaking his head with a chuckle, he lurched forward to snatch her ankles and tug.

Rey yelped as she collapsed onto the mattress, dissolving into giggles once more as Ben pinned her wrists above her head with one hand and tickled her side with the other.

“Who has the high ground _now?”_ he sneered.

She raised her hips off the bed to grind against his straining dick and when he paused to rock into her, Rey hooked her calf over his waist and rolled them over.

_“Me,_ of course,” she said, settling into his lap with a shimmy.

The front of her shirt fell over her crotch and Ben found that supremely disappointing, but he still had her hands and with a short yank, her chest dropped towards his face. He mouthed at the soft swells of her breasts through her t-shirt, suckling her until the thin material clung wetly to her nipple.

“Ben,” she whispered, scooting her backside across his stomach.

He released her slender wrists to grip her waist and guide her up his body. She tossed her shirt over her head as he brought her cunt to his lips, her arousal seeping through her panties to slip down her inner thighs. Ben ran his tongue over her slit, savoring the ambrosial tang through soaked cotton, and her belly quivered with an appreciative groan. He watched the pale undersides of her breasts jiggle as she reeled against his mouth gently, trying not to smother him in her search for friction.

Ben had no such concern. With a rumble he pulled her closer, the point of his tongue circling her clit. Her hips bucked when he wrapped his lips around her throbbing bud of nerves, a wave of hot slick spilling over his chin. He opened his mouth wide to cover her entire sex, his tongue prodding at her entrance through her panties.

_“Please,”_ she said. “I need more, Ben.”

“Sweetheart,” he answered, reaching between her legs to shift her drenched underwear aside. “You need to tell me what you want.”

Her thighs trembled as she rose to her knees and Ben chased her with a moan, craning his neck to get another taste.

“I _want_ for you to stop teasing me-–”

Well, if that was all, Ben was more than happy to give her precisely what she asked for. He shuffled out of his jeans blindly, unable to see where they landed on the floor as Rey squirmed her way down his body. He was still scrambling out of his shirt when she wrapped a deft, little hand around his length, holding her panties to one side as she settled in his lap, sinking fully onto him.

They exhaled together.

It didn’t matter how many times they fucked–and they’ve fucked in great abundance–being inside her never ceased to be anything short of amazing. Rey was always so hot and wet and tight for him, perfect to stretch around his cock. It was even better when she rode him, head thrown back as she bounced on his dick without any semblance of control.

Rey heaved herself up, nearly allowing him to slide free, and used her whole body weight to heavily drop again. Her eyes gradually closed as she set a slow, punishing rhythm for herself, her mouth falling open with a satisfied cry.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” he crooned, brushing the tips of his fingers against her exposed clit, pulsing with need just above where their bodies joined. “Ride my cock like you _mean_ it.”

She laughed, flattening her hands against his chest to remain balanced. “Why do I have to do all the hard work?”

Ben snarled, nearly knocking her over with the force of his upward thrust.

“Fine, if that’s how it is,” he said with a rough snap of his hips, “you’ll just have to take whatever I give you.”

She squealed through her laughter, nails curling into his chest as he promptly sat, gliding deeper into her. Ben held her close enough for their skin to stick with sweat, huffing as they jerked together. Her eyes were dazed, her lips uncoordinated as they swept along his jaw in a series of nibbles. There would be a trail of reddened marks in the shape of her open mouth when she finished but he was too engrossed with her to care what inane comments Hux would surely make come Monday morning.

_“Yes,”_ she keened, arching her spine as he tipped her backward.

Ben firmly planted his knees on the bed, bending her legs so that the tops of her thighs pressed flat against her chest, and pounded into her relentlessly. Her breathless cries synced with each slippery clap of their hips thumping together, a tremor spreading from her belly to her toes. Her muscles were visibly twitching with overstimulated pleasure as he fucked her.

His vision blurred when her body seized around him, a wail erupting in her chest as she milked his cock with each clench of her climax. Ben moaned as his balls pulled tight, a shiver running down his back and suddenly he was spurting into her with hot surges, their hips colliding erratically.

Rey shuddered as his cock slipped from her swollen, nearly red pussy, his spend trickling onto the sheets to form a slick puddle. She turned onto her side and dragged his arm over to rest in the graceful curve of her side, not bothered by the mess of come beneath their heaving, breathless bodies.

Once their gasping had eased she leaned towards her bedside table, gingerly pushing her battered copy of _Wuthering Heights_ off the edge. It landed with a quiet slap against the hardwood floor, out of sight and out of mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! The smut was probably on the silly side but whatever. Sex should be fun.
> 
> There will be an epilogue and then this fic will be complete! :)


	5. Three Years Later

Ben stood before the mirror hanging in their short hallway, taking advantage of the fading afternoon sun as he pursed his lips in concentration, large fingers fumbling with the angular ends of a black silk tie.

 

Rey’s voice was high and strained when she called for him from behind the closed bathroom door. “Ben, I need help.”

 

He let the ends of his tie fall back against his chest, a small smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

 

“I thought I wasn’t allowed to see you beforehand.”

 

He could hear her scowl in her snappish tone and his smile spread into a toothy grin. “That’s _tomorrow.”_

 

Under her breath, she added: “Jackass.”

 

Ben leaned into the door as he opened it, recognizing the issue and at once knowing he wouldn’t be able to solve it. Midway up her back, the zipper of her cocktail dress split to create a deep V that exposed her shoulder blades and an especially cute mole he liked to kiss while fucking her from behind. He stepped inside to stroke the round, little blemish with the rough pad of his thumb.

 

“Sweetheart…” he started. No added strength would pull together her zipper. He wasn’t convinced he should even attempt it.

 

“No,” she interrupted fiercely. “Please, just _try,_ okay? Please, Ben.”

 

He could only do his best. As he suspected, though, the seams of her dress wouldn’t be budged. With a sigh, he smoothed his palms up her back.

 

“If I yank more than that, your dress will tear,” he said, pausing in thought. “You could wear a sweater over it?”

 

The look she shot him was positively deadly. “I don’t _have_ a sweater that will match. And it’s July!”

 

Ben was growing accustomed to her newfound vitriol, however. He spared a glance at his watch.

 

“If we get to the courthouse in the next forty-five minutes, we can still elope.”

 

_“Ben!”_

 

He laughed as she whirled on him--she was much too easy to tease. “What? We could add two more days to the honeymoon if we leave now. Just you, me, and Jimothy.”

 

Her nose scrunched up in displeasure but she could barely contain her smile. “Stop calling my baby that.”

 

“It makes you laugh,” he argued. Just as it had two months ago when they had been spitballing names for the first time, _The Office_ blaring in the background.

 

Now she was a few weeks into her second trimester and her flat belly was finally expanding to accommodate a bouncing baby _something._ The changes were subtle enough that she could still hide the pregnancy but to Ben, they were obvious. He rested his hands on her widened hips, drawing her towards him.

 

She huffed, resting her cheek on his chest. “Why couldn’t your sperm wait for three weeks? Then my dress would still fit.”

 

Ben was fairly certain that regardless of what he said, he would still be in the wrong, so silence seemed safest.

 

After a few moments of peace, she pulled away, resolved. “Well, we can’t be late to our own rehearsal. I guess it’s time to break out one of the maternity dresses.”

 

His fingertips grazed the slight roundness of her abdomen. “You don’t mind if Jimothy steals your show?”

 

Rey rolled her eyes. “Everyone will still be looking at the bride. We probably should have made an announcement sooner, anyway.”

 

He trailed after her as she padded barefoot into the bedroom, squirming out of her dress as she went--the same one she had worn on the night he had proposed--to sift through their closet.

 

He knew that telling twenty of their closest friends (nevermind his overbearing mother) about the newest addition to the Solo family was just one more unnecessary stressor they didn’t have time for tonight, but as Ben watched her stand in her underwear, flicking through loose-fitting gowns, he felt ready.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's a short (mostly dumb) epilogue but it's just to give you guys an idea of where they end up...as if it wasn't pretty obvious. :) Are they having a Jimothy or a Pamalamadingdong? I have no idea. You get to decide.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has read this fic!! It has been so much fun to work on.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading this garbage. 
> 
> I will not be writing a follow up to this but Poe feels guilty and gets over it.


End file.
